CTU attack inaccurate, unbalanced

The CTU's misuse of a Canadian report as an
excuse to bash the structural reforms of the '80s and early
'90s relies on inaccurate and unbalanced interpretation,
says Business NZ.

The Index of Labour Market Well-Being
for OECD Countries* compares worker well-being in 16 OECD
countries from 1980 to 2001.

The CTU claims the report
confirms its mantra that the Employment Contracts Act and
the reforms of the 1980s and 1990s were bad for employees.

In fact, the report makes it clear that almost all the
1980-2001 erosion in real wages took place in 1983 - the
year of the wage and price freeze - and that incomes have
risen consistently since 1986 (see chart 14).

New
Zealand's performance against the Index has improved
steadily since 1991 - the year the Employment Contracts Act
was passed (see chart 21). The point that seems to elude
the CTU is that other countries have grown more consistently
than New Zealand and that richer countries can pay their
workforces better.

Nevertheless, since the early 1990s the
New Zealand economy has produced over 450,000 new jobs. The
reforms of the '80s and '90s also produced a halving in the
unemployment rate since December 1991.

*Index of Labour
Market Well-Being for OECD Countries by the Canadian Centre
for the Study of Living Standards, downloadable on
www.csls.ca

The New Zealand Council of Trade Unions Te Kauae Kaimahi brings together over 350,000 New Zealand union members in 40 affiliated unions. We are the united voice for working people and their families in New Zealand.

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